Topic Selection

Please choose your topic from the list below.

Select Student Select Topic

 Mumbai Floods... a look back at those days!!!

As I write this (at the midnight hour), 19 years have elapsed since the day I was stuck in the great deluge a.k.a. The Mumbai Floods that wreaked havoc on 26th July 2005. Little did I know that the city I was dying to get out of that day, would become my permanent address one day. And that I'd have a HOME here.

But, things happen. People come and go. I came. I saw. I Conquered. (Veni Vidi Vici). Not my lines though. these lines are attributed to one Mr. Julius Caesar. It's been a long time since that eventful day dawned - however with each passing year and thanks to climate change, we are reminded of the perils of toying with mother nature. Every time mankind did something on those lines, mother nature has responded with all her might. The results, almost always, have been intimidating.

I'm sure today, survivors like us look back at the day with a sigh of relief that we are ALIVE. What hounds me most is the fact that while I call myself a victim of the great flood, I'd be damned if I discount the plight of hundreds of REAL victim. Some lost their nearx and dear ones. Some perished, leaving behind a trail of blood and tears. Many never made it home. I did, albeit to my aunt's house since in 2005, I was just a visitor. I had braved the elements - but so did several other that day. the authorities, everyone was stuck in it. 

I'd just like to take a moment, take a deep breath and thank my lucky starts for watching over me. May the souls of all those who fell victim to mother nature, rest in peace.

Nostalgia - Revisited!!!

I’ve been meaning to write for quite some time, but I just kept putting it for some ‘other time’ – thought I might as well just do it. Recently I took a trip to my hometown, Kannur (Kerala) to attend a wedding in the family. Oh no, it’s not about the wedding – that went on smoothly – met relatives (mine and on the in-laws’ side, both), the works. What made me write this is the nostalgia bit.

No, the wedding once again is not the reason for nostalgia – though in a way it was – as in, it reminded me of my own wedding, 4 years ago, same place and almost the same time. It was the trip in itself that did this to me, AGAIN. In other words, every trip to Kerala since I ‘grew up’ has always been transporting me back to ‘good old days’.

The ‘ancestral’ houses where I grew up, visited every summer, had fun (needless to say), got caught, got punished, learned some wonderful lessons in life, learned some bitter truths, enjoyed scenic beauty, breathed fresh air, all seems to be crumbling to pieces. One of the houses has already bitten the dust (read ‘been demolished’) and the other, although standing upright, shows all signs of aging. The strong pillars that once supported the house, need support now. The windows that opened to fresh air and greenery all around, now creak painfully. The roof that protected us from the elements now needs protection from the most fleeting yet determined element – TIME. It hurts to see the representatives of my memories of ‘good old days’ now leaving my hand just like Jack left Rose’s, a la ‘Titanic’.

I remember the quiet warm afternoons at my paternal grandpa’s house when he and grandma would sit in a corner on the verandah looking out to infinity, hardly speaking anything – but actually expressing volumes in their silence. They taught me that love does not always need verbal expression. My maternal grandma did not have a single picture of any deities or religious heads. She was a believer all the same. She taught me that faith does not need an idolatrous expression. My cousins fought with me, hurt me (physically), made me cry, felt bad, made up to me – but they never said they’re sorry. They taught me, an apology does not need a mushy expression.

Where’s all of it now? All gone with the wind. Or rather, most of it is. It’s the time – that will never come back. The time when I was a kid, was innocent in all ways. The time that I spend with family. The time I played in the open grounds, fell down, bruised my elbows and knees. The time when a fight never embittered relations and had a very short lifespan. The time when envy was OK. The time when the competition was healthy. The time when snatching things from younger siblings didn’t make you a thief or didn’t end relations. Time, when punishment was always taken and never protested since the punishers only meant good. A time when chiding by elders was always taken constructively. A time when it was not a shame to cry – when crying actually translated to calling out for help (melodrama added in generous quantities). A time when happiness was pure and unadulterated.

That’s what I miss the most. Those times. Here I am, writing this in a time when punishment is not welcome – because we all grew up and now we think, we are faultless. A time when it’s not OK to cry since that makes us a wimp. A time when playing is more digital and less physical. We strain our eyes and thumbs more that our mind, body, and soul. A time when competition is the way of life and definitely not healthy anymore. A time when a fight could end relations – things that took years to build. A time when a truth is expensive and calls for a lot of courage for expression. A time when lies are commonplace since they are cheap and just calls for vivid imagination. A time when falling down means medical bills, taking leave from work (or at least one wants to stay home). A time when taking things from siblings leads to lawsuits.

Now that that time is almost gone, it hurts to see my daughter grow in solitude. No siblings to share her expressions with. No friends to play or fight with. I came home from school into the loving arms of my mother. Waited patiently every evening for my father (to see if he has brought us some goodies). My daughter comes home to a father who’s getting ready for work and will drop her at the day care. I wonder if she will ever get to experience the wonderful childhood that I did. Anyways all that can try is to give her the biggest possible slice of that wonderful time called ‘good old days’ to cherish when she grows up.

Bye for now. See you all later.

Mobile Myths and Realities

Hello, friends. I’m sure every now and then, someone or the other tells you stuff that you ‘should not do’ with your various stuff, especially mobile phones. While most of that information is gleaned from SNS and apps like WhatsApp (oh, you unproductive piece of technology), the self-proclaimed pundits claim the ‘warnings’ to be true since they have heeded to it and have seen good results.  Really – naah… far from the truth. None of these naysayers have experienced anything different from what they are actually supposed to. Then why do they propagate such falsehood? The reason is an apparent lack of knowledge and the means to confirm the veracity of such claims. Nobody spends time in analyzing such stuff – they just fall for its face value. Let me help you get over a few of such omnipresent myths. Man!!! I love myth-busting and also seeing the faces of such nay-sayers after their bubble has burst.

You Should Let Your Battery Drain Completely Before Recharging

This one has been doing rounds since times immemorial. This is not completely false – here’s the catch, though. This ‘warning’ held true for the old NiCAD and NiMH batteries – they performed better when you let them fully drain before charging back to 100%. This, however, does not apply to the new age Li-ion batteries since they perform better when they remained charged. These new batteries do not have a 'cell memory’ unlike their older counterparts.

You don’t have to let your battery completely drain before you recharge. Back in the day, old NiCad batteries found in our early handsets would have a memory whereby repeatedly charging when half full, for example, would result in unspent cells effectively dying. But modern day Li-ion batteries will come of no harm whatever the percentage of power you’ve got left.

So if a know-it-all tries to tell you otherwise if you’re plugging your mobile in every day, you can politely inform them it’s actually the preferred method of charging.

Also, if you leave your phone charging and it’s reached 100 per cent you don’t have to worry there. Smartphones are smart enough to stop juicing once it’s full.

Note: You may want to avoid keeping your mobile phone under your pillow, whether charging or not. Not that it kills you – just that your pillow metaphorically ‘smothers’ your phone leaving less room for heat dissipation and leaving the phone overheated. Anyways, who in their right mind would want to ‘sleep’ with a ‘distractive’ tool right beside their heads? Not me!!!

Apps Running in the Background Should Be Closed to Save Battery and Avoid Slowdowns

Another ‘old wife’s tale’ doing rounds in the mobile circles since ages. This has led to an onslaught of ‘memory cleaners’. They are churned out a dozen a week. And too bad – many people actually believe their phones benefit from these apps. While all smartphones are capable of multi-tasking and leave a couple of apps running in the background, there’s a good reason to it. Doing so lends efficiency to multitasking. Especially considering the fact that the not just the phone, the users multitask too. Hence ‘background running’ of such apps is imperative. Now the above warning stems from an incorrectly places concern that this multitasking impedes the phone’s performance since such additional processes use system resources, and the more programs you have running, the slower the device can get. Now the reality is that even with apps running in the background, the battery drain is minimal. The OS limits battery usage by background apps and hence multitasking is the last thing that I could think of as an impediment to the battery life of phone performance. Truth be told, it’s good for some of the most used apps to run in the background since it becomes easier for the phone to run / execute those tasks. It’s like we keeping the mostly used articles (at home / office) on the desktop / table top and leaving the least used articles neatly tucked in the cupboard / Almira.

You may die if you speak on your mobile phone as it’s getting charged

This one’s been around for a while now – with warnings and ‘doctored’ images on SNS and time-killer apps like WhatsApp. This is a very notorious viral alert – but that’s all it is – a HOAX in bold letters. I’ve spoken while my phone was being charged several times since I bought my first phone in 2004. I got electrocuted several times, all my fingers are burnt, my ear is heavily damaged, my face was blown off and on one occasion, I died too. Too bad, my dear enemies – I lied. I’m still alive and kicking with 0% harm ever derived from speaking on my phone as it got charged. The reason is that unless your battery / charger is seriously damaged or made of really cheap ‘oriental’ materials, you don’t stand a chance of getting harmed. The charger is designed to let a minuscule amount of power reach your phone battery (remember, it’s not a lead-acetate car battery). Don’t believe me? Touch the metallic pin / end of your charger – got electrocuted? No.. right? That’s precisely my point.

A mobile phone can cause a petrol station to explode

This is not as old as the earlier two – however, is taken seriously nevertheless. Reasons quote for this – mobile phones use GSM technology (I seriously fail to understand the harm), a mobile battery can cause a spark etc. Now let’s check the truth – petrol stations attendants also use SIM-based wireless card terminals. They use the same network technology as our phones i.e. GSM. If they can’t ignite fires, your phones can’t either. Secondly, let’s take mobile batteries for instance – so far there hasn’t been a single documented (and verified) case of a mobile phone lighting up a petrol station. I’ve read some articles – but they found their place in some interesting websites like www.snopes.com and www.hoax-slayer.com. At least I know how much to trust such ‘warnings’. And if batteries could cause explosions, then cars and other 4+ wheelers should not be allowed in petrol pumps too – they have larger and more potent batteries. One very likely cause of such ‘petrol station fire’ is the otherwise harmless static discharge that happens even from the material of your seat as you exit your car (lift your derriere). I’m not going to digress on static electricity so you can stop yawning.

A mobile phone can cook an egg

A good one – I could laugh the whole day. It’s silly too – too silly (for any grown up who has even an ounce of gray matter in their brains) to believe. It’s true that mobile phones do emit radiation but it’s a fraction of a fraction’s worth of power (mobiles typically only can produce 0.25W) needed to cook an egg. It certainly couldn’t produce the 70 degrees or more to boil / cook eggs. In reality, not even a 100 mobiles stacked on top of an egg calling each other could warm an egg more than a degree. In fact, mobiles don’t even directly transmit to each other. They have to call a nearby relay / cell site first, so putting the egg between them makes no difference. Too bad all you ignorant and lazy bums, you have to head for the kitchen to cook your eggs – you phone isn’t doing it for you.

Mobile phones can cause brain cancer

This is just like the ‘egg’ joke. The well-read and educated scientists could not find an evidence that corroborates this hoax, yet.  However, the pseudo-intellectuals claim to know more and end up believing such jokes. Research explains that mobiles are ELF (Extremely Low Frequency) devices and this low-powered radio and microwave radiation doesn’t have the right frequency or energy to ionize molecules and change DNA. Long story short - while there is still some uncertainty due to the lack of long-term study, evidence so far suggests there is no link between mobiles and cancer.

So don’t let some dubious website / app instil unwarranted fears in your heads. Read, comprehend, get your facts right and don’t just lap up any rubbish that is thrown at you by these so-called wise-guys. I just tried to show you some light – I leave the rest to you to comprehend.

Bye for now!!!

After me, the deluge… a.k.a. 3 nights NOT at a call centre

History…
I'm sure this is what everybody says, I did too... but I didn't get any lucky with that. I faced the deluge and survived. Please don't let this fool you - what I got the other day (rather... days) was a cakewalk compared to what several other Mumbaikars faced. It was that dreadful morning of 26th July in the year 2005 I'm talking about. Another walk down memory lane.

I wasn't a resident of Mumbai then. I had just come to attend a sales review meeting scheduled on the 25th of July. It was the last one I had to attend... since I had made clear my intention to quit shortly. All went fine and we called it a day by 1800 IST. There were five of us.... 2 from Sales and 3 from Service (Maintenance). The five-some hit a bar and went home after some revelry. We all slept like logs completely oblivious of what the next day had in store for us.

The D-day…
Then the D-day broke... a crisp and clear morning. We had our breakfast and were planning the day ahead of us... coincidentally, that was the day we had to return to Nagpur. My ticket was booked for the evening train... Vidarbha express. The Service trio had their tickets booked for the afternoon Sevagram express. The threesome had plans to shop at Manish Market, Dadar. I, on the other hand, chose to visit my paternal aunt (बूआ) in Thane. We parted ways at Mumbai CST station... I guess it was close to 1000 IST.
Oblivious to the reality, I was in the Thane-bound train, listening to FM radio. It had already started raining and I wasn't surprised since it was July... perfect month for the rains. I didn't get a seat though since initially, I preferred to get some wind-in-the-hair and later the train got crowded. Silly me.
As the train rolled into Thane station, it stopped for a red light (???). I'm still fine, not a worry, not even the then heavy rain bothered me. Reality slowly crept in as the train stopped just a few feet from the station and refused to budge... for a good 30 min and still counting. When I finally peeked out... I saw nothing (almost) as visibility was diminished by the torrential rain.
I was getting worried... not about the incessant rain... but the delay. You see, I'm a pauper when it comes to a particular virtue called ‘patience’. Finally, red turned to green and the train finally halted AT the station... visibility still diminished. I stepped out of the train only to get drenched to my undies within no time. Still not quite perturbed with what was happening, I walked on to find a rickshaw to get to my aunt’s place. Although, I had never been in such a situation earlier – I have seen similar stuff – so I kept moving. After getting JILTED by many a rickshaw driver, I finally managed to get one geriatric knight in rusted armour to ‘ferry’ me home. I offered double-pay – he refused.
Now for the scare. It wasn’t until I boarded this 3-wheeler that the reality started stripping itself naked unto my unprepared and definitely uninterested eyes. I got to know what hit me in the face (and everywhere else). It was not just a heavy rain – it was a full-blown inundation. Abou Ben Adhem (for the uninitiated, read https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems-and-poets/poems/detail/44433 ... a poem by Leigh Hunt) was ‘powerboat’ing his way through the fast submerging lanes and by-lanes of Thane some familiar, others very unfamiliar, in an honest effort to get me home safe and sound. After a boat ride of about an hour (usually 30 min and just fine) I finally reached my destination and even after insisting and requested, Abou Ben Adhem did not accept a single buck more than what was rightfully his. He just said, ‘ऊपरवाला सब देख रहा हैं' (He's watching me) and left.
I squish-squashed my way to my aunt’s flat thinking finally it was all over. She was surprised I could make it to her home safely whilst her own son was stranded in Malad, in his office. Her elder son got away with murder – he had just flown to Bangalore on an official assignment and had clearly missed all the watery excitement in Mumbai. Now cut to scene 2…

The house arrest…
My woes were far from over. Although I was in the comfy confines of my aunt’s place – I was actually stranded. (Auntie… don’t be mad at me… it’s not about you ). All we both could do was eat – watch the news on TV – eat – watch more news on TV – talk – watch some more news on TV – crash. All TV channels gave non-stop coverage of the inundation and made me realise that while I was stranded – I was something many of them were not … SAFE. If it were not her, I’d be stranded at some railway station like several other commuters that day. That evening I proved myself once bitten but too idiotic to be shy. That evening, I took another boat ride to the station to catch my evening train - only to get CAUGHT in a puddle sitting in a rattling old 3-wheeled excuse of a ride. This time, I had asked for it and got it too... in plenty. After a while of pushing and shoving, we finally reached the station only to know the obvious - that all trains were either running eternally late or were cancelled. I could stand in a never-ending queue to get a refund on my ticket but (read earlier paragraphs) I beat a hasty and soggy retreat. Things that should hang low, were now shrivelled. I reached home and joined my aunt for dinner - what else could we do, anyways?

The aftermath...
Come day 2 and I had AFTERMATH served piping hot for breakfast. I could choose from:

Flooded lanes filled with damaged vehicles
Fallen boundary walls
Knee deep heavily muddied water
Dying mobile network
Downed ATM network (I couldn’t beg for money either ... who would be out on the streets in their normal mind to give me alms)
Screwed-up transport system (nothing new, eh?)

Man… I was full to the neck with such a delicious spread. I had to partake of this ambrosia / manna for the next 48 hours. I had the balls to step out on day 2 to pay the local ATM a casual visit – but the a**hole just wouldn’t entertain me – so I had to return empty-handed. That night, I got a call (I repeat GOT A CALL… after spending hours to no end, without a single network bar on my phone) from the Dadar-bound threesome. Man, those idiots were worried about me – whilst they themselves spent nights on some platform at Dadar station sleeping on newspapers surviving on complimentary food offered by the station caterers. That reassured by of my safety abundantly. Man, I was so lucky to be alive that day. That night we hatched an escape plan and escape we did.

The great escape:
Day 4, July 29th, we all rush from our respective locations to converge at Dadar. We took the first bus (enough of trains getting cancelled due to waterlogging) out of Mumbai. We headed back to Nagpur via Pune. Once the bus escaped the water force-field of Mumbai, everything changed. We saw the SUN, clear skies, nice weather, dry roads… I’m going to cry now. We were just short of yelling our lungs out. After 20+ hours in the bus, we finally kissed the Nagpur soil and heaved a euphoric sigh of relief. The ordeal was finally over. It definitely left me shaken but not stirred (sorry Mr. Bond). I never knew I would be back to this Water World soon - just the next month that is... to become a RESIDENT and well... never look back.

I thank all you brave souls who sat through my ordeal - but I SALUTE those to lived that horrible excuse of a day called 26/7/2005 and still went on and on unfazed and finally put everything that happened that day, behind them. You Sir(s) / Ma'am(s) are really great!!!

Moving on...

Hello people,

I'm back... this time with a heavy heart. I don't make bones about how I feel, do I? And I don't give a damn about it either, do I? Anyways, I recently got a bad news. They rightly say bad news travels fast. How I wish it didn't.

All this started almost 4 decades ago. A young and dashing Malayali man rents an incommodious room in a senescent building. That's my septuagenarian father. He rents the place as a bachelor, later gets married and moves to a trifle bigger place in the same building. I guess this building was built in the first quarter of the twentieth century. Just a wild guess. On a cold Christmas evening, I decided to join the party - I was born in a quaint town in North Kerala! When I was 2 months old and still trying to figure out my next mischievous move, my mum took me to this place which I would call HOME for the next three decades.

A little over two years, my mum gifted me this wonderful companion the world calls SISTER. Together we grew up in this small yet cosy house. We always complained that it was too small. We at times felt embarrassed to tell our friends we stayed there. We hardly called our friends over so they would never know where we stayed. I guess we never realised then what we would feel today.

We played, we fought, we loved, we hated, we envied, we won, we lost, we conquered, we acceded, we conceded, we facilitated, we circumvented, we felt pleasure, pain, glory, vanity, insanity, delusion and what not (phew… you guys are still reading? My fingers are killing me). We did so many things there – good, bad, naughty, insane, cruel, great and I can go on and on. We grew up, went to school, went to college, got jobs and went to work. But we always returned home to just one place, HEAVEN to rich and poor alike – called HOME. It embraced us the way we were – never argued with us. Never judged us. Never chided us. Always provided the warm and comfort that we needed. We slept peacefully in the star filled (sometimes cloudy and overcast) nights and it kept us safe. It’s crumbling walls still assured us of peaceful times inside. The rusted latches on the doors and windows told us we were safe and need not worry about the cruel world outside.

Every year, during Diwali we would decorate this ageing, wrinkly old lady with whatever we could manage, but she never complained. Instead, she shone with the resplendence of stars (at least to the four of us). The window near our main door opened up to the lane opposite our building. It’s the same window where I sat as a kid and watched people and time go by. My father would then appear on the horizon (of that lane) pedalling his bicycle home for lunch. I still remember the please that encompassed me at that sight.
We never knew one day all this would simply fade into oblivion.

As we grew up, so did our parents – just that they aged. The bonds of love grew stronger with each passing day even as we were completely oblivious to this fact. We etched several memories on to the iridescent
canvas called LIFE. But I guess we painted in water colours. Because today, it’s all gone. The old lady was ruthlessly felled even as she was screaming out for help. She wasn’t dead yet. But nobody heard her screams. Nobody saw her tears as one brick crumbled after another. Nobody knew the agony of that old beauty and she was slowly and meticulously reduced to mere rubble. All it’s pristine, glory, it’s magnificence all vanished into thin air.

But wait – that’s not what happened. She lives on – now in the fond memories of the families she once housed. I’m not sure about the others – but she’ll always be a part of my fond memories. She’s been an integral part of my life. She’s lives on. She’s the titanic I once sailed in – so what if she went down? She’ll always be remembered. Because that was what I called HOME SWEET HOME. That was the only other place outside my mother’s womb that I felt warm and safe.

Yet another day has dawned and now - the nocturnal creature that I am – I must hit the sack. Bye folks. But remember – your home has a soul – trust me. Be kind to it. I am not homeless. I have a home sweetly populated by my beautiful wife and cute daughter. But what went down to rubble, my first home – will always be on my mind, in some corner, reminiscent of my wonderful past.

Adieus. Ciao. Bye.

Nostalgia

Nostalgia

Hello friends,

How often do we sit in the comfy confines of our homes and let our a cold sigh with mutterings like "Oh those days" or "Those good old days" or maybe "Where are those days?"? I bet many times. I do that too. Quite often at that. The key cause to this effect is 'COMPARISON'. Disagree? It's simple - terms like good, bad, ugly are all SUBJECTIVE. What's good to one may not be so to another. I drink - my wife hates it. I hate spicy food especially pickles - she loves it. So you see - it's subjective.

By the way, not all bygone days were golden. Some had black shades to them too. But most of them were  golden and they still put a smile on your otherwise glum faces. As I was saying - it's the comparison that gets us here. We tend to compare THOSE days with THESE days. Let me assure you - the more you do it - the more it will stink. THESE days are almost always WORSE. About 5-10 years later even 29/5/2016 (today) will seem heavenly. Today I'm complaining - tomorrow, I'll yearn for days like today. I'm sure my daughter will cry out loud, "Dad, you really lived those days? It was so much fun. Look at the times we live in now - it sucks", and so on.

This is how life progresses. With the advent of newer technologies, we seem to be drifting apart into our lonely microcosms. We tend to be happy with our privacy. Little do we realize that it's a hard bargain between privacy and social life. You cannot get both at the same time - with the same efficiency as we did as kids. What did we care about privacy then? At best, the only time I needed privacy was while peeing or changing clothes - that's it. I did not have lockers, no 'personal stuff' - nothing much to hide except for my Johnson.

We tend to hide and yet want to be discovered. We do not go out and yet want to be reached. We cannot quit our couches and still want 6-pack abs. We do not call and still miss phone conversations. We do not put the efforts and still cry our loud for not getting the results. We do not keep in touch but still call our friends 'fair weather'. Finally - we have screwed up our today and still call yesterday 'golden days'?

Our 'today' is taken for granted. We mess with it - we literally screw it black and blue and have the temerity to call the same today 'a good old day' a few years later. That's why they say, 'live the moment'. It's easy to yearn for those 'good old days' - but do we realize that we still have a precious gift in our hands. Hey stop looking here and there - it's all around you. It's called TODAY (I did not mean the contraceptive). Live today so well that we can minimize the need to compare and thereby miss 'good old days'.

Honestly, comparison almost always leads to despair. So let's turn over a new leaf. Let's resolve that we will not mistreat our 'today' and wait till it becomes our 'good old yesterday'.

Today rocks!!! So stop staring at your screens and get lost guys - TODAY is waiting for you.

Ciao!!!

Lazy Bum

Inside the mind of a lazy bum (that's me)

Hello friends,

I have been meaning to write this blog for a very long time now (see, this is where I'm coming from). It's just that one unimportant thing led to another and here I am... writing after ages of having initiated that thought. Anyways, that's too much for an intro, isn't it?

I remember, as a kid, my parents always said to me... "Don't waste time. Study (sometimes followed by curses I won't mention here). You cannot get back time. It's a precious resource you're wasting. At this age, you only have to study (that was the '80s though and then it was true too). Once you grow up, you have to do several things in addition to it. If you can't find time to study or do other important stuff now, how will you find time as a grown-up?

Been there, done that? I'm sure some of us (let's be honest - most of us) have heard this as kids. Too bad, I didn't pay much attention to it and here I am - a full-grown lazy bum. Call me a couch potato if you please. The point is - why am I what I am - lazy. I never took the time to understand why. For a good measure, self-realization crept in lately and I have at least accepted the fact that I'm lazy - a procrastinator. The first task accomplished - I know what I'm ailing from. Yes - that's the right term - ailment.

I know I'm not alone - but I'm not proud of it either. And let me also inform - this is not a remedial talk / article. It's an expression of what  feel and the way I feel it. The other day, I was watching an episode of TED Talks - one that covered precisely this topic. That's what finally opened my eyes to the reality. Suddenly everything that I do (or rather do not do) started building the picture - block by block. Finally, I got a very logical explanation to my ailment.

TBC... Some really important work just reared its ugly head. See you later, folks.

******************************************************************

Hey, I'm back. Yesterday we discussed 'the ailment' - now let's see how it works. it all starts with a genuine need to accomplish a task e.g. exercising, cleaning, washing, cycling, getting a bank job done, finishing an assessment / assignment etc. Let's call it the task or Step 1. What should ideally follow is execution. But wait... isn't this (some other unimportant yet interesting task) nice? How about finishing this and then the original task at hand? Let's call it the distraction or step 2.

A recent case in point was last week when my wife asked me to email her flight tickets to her. So here we go:

1. Task: Email wife's flight ticket (PDF) to her (1100 IST)

2. Distraction: I boot up my PC (1105 IST), open Chromium and see YouTube in the 'most visited sites' list and inadvertently click on it (that email can wait). I start off with some movie trailers which then led me to Lost Castles of England, followed by The Cannibal of Scotland, Mysteries from the Deep Sea and so on (1300 IST).

3. More distraction (1310 IST): Hey, I didn't have my tea (from the nearby tea stall). Let me have it quickly and then get back home and email the tickets.

4. Distractions continued (1330 IST): Some random phone calls, random chats on WhatsApp, checking random posts on Facebook etc.

5. Completion (1645 IST): I finally reach home and get straight to my PC (which I left running, just that I remembered to turn off the monitor) and FINALLY email her the flight tickets.

Start: 1100 IST.
Finish: 1700 IST
Wastage: 4 hours

I'm sure successful people would die either laughing or amazed at my irrepressible talent at wasting a rather precious commodity called TIME. Ask me WHY and I'll look up to the sky shrugging my shoulders, rolling my eyes.

The way I look at it - it's not an incurable ailment. It's just that the WILL to do so or to get out of this self-deprecating habit is missing or very weak. What I failed to understand is that the Task (Step 1) HAS to be done - regardless of distractions. There is a deadline to it too. Here's why I could accomplish it in the first place.

Reason 1: This task had a deadline. It's no use emailing the tickets once the flight takes off. It has to be sent well in advance.

Reason 2: Sense of panic.

I'm lucky that the part of my brains where PANIC resides, is well nourished. So as time passed by, the panic cells started kicking in and telling me - hey, don't forget what your wife asked you to do. Time's running out. You inner voice!!! Mmmmwah ;-)

Now there's a completely different genre of Tasks - the ones that do not have a deadline e.g. working out, taking the dog for a walk, cycling, swimming, weekend outings, catching up with friends and family, calling up near and dear ones - these are the tasks that most like get delayed exponentially. This is for the simple reason that there is no deadline for accomplishing them. But that's no excuse for delaying or worse - not doing them. They are important too.

So inside this procrastinator's brain, it's always a tiff between Distractions outside and Panic cells in the brains. This way, certain tasks get accomplished while most of them get delayed. But like I said earlier - I'm not alone. I see many people my age and otherwise, doing the same things that I do - the way I do. This kinda concerns me.

Friends, let's all remember one thing - TIME is indeed precious (excuse the cliche). The more you waste it, the more you regret. Regrets get you nowhere - they may probably, just probably tell you better that to waste time. Let's not wait till it's too late. What if the Panic cells don't kick in? What if there was nobody to remind you about the task at hand? What if someone heavily depended on the timely accomplishment of that task.

Procrastination is not worth ANYTHING. Let's all look within ourselves and ask - Why can't that (the distraction) wait. Is it really important? Can't I do that later? Do I really have to do it? I'm sure soon you'll have the answers cut out in rock that reads 'No / It's not that important / It CAN wait / Don't do this'. And eventually, we won't have to ask ourselves those stupid questions. Stupid - not owing to the intrinsic nature of the questions - but because we should not have to ask them in the first place. We should now how to prioritise the tasks at hand and manage our time.

I'm sure I'll start this introspection / retrospection... maybe tomorrow !!!

Bye for now. Remember, you have other important things to do. So go now!!!